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The Lineage of an 
American Patriot 

AN ADDRESS 



BY 



Howard Duffield, D.D. 



THE MINISTER OK THE 



** Old First " Presbyterian Church 
In the City of New York 

AT THE 

Washington Birthday Service 

OF THE 

Sons of the Revolution 

Of the State of New York 
FEBRUARY NINETEENTH, MDCCCXCIX 



BoNNELL, Silver & Company 
New York 



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31190 



Copyrighted 1899 
by Howard Dufficld 



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KEY-NOTE 



^ Land that we love ! Thou Future of the JVorld ! 
Thou refuge of the noble heart oppressed! 
Oh never he thy shining image hurled 
From its high place in the adoring breast 
Of him who worships thee with jealous love! 
Keep thou thy starry forehead as the dove 
All white, and to the eternal Dawn inclined! 
Thou art not for thyself but for mankind, 
And to despair of thee, were to despair 
Of man, of man's high destiny, of God ! " 

R. W. Gilder. 



The Lineage of an 
American Patriot 

''And I found a register of the gene- 
alogy of tkefn which cayne up at the first, 
and found written therein, * These are 
the children of the province that went 

up out of the captivity:" 

Nehemiah vii : 5, 6. 



SONS of the Revolution, and members 
of kindred societies, I bid you welcome 
to the "Old First" Church. Its doors swing 
open of their own accord to such a com- 
pany of patriots. This is an ancient shrine 
of American liberty. The watchfire of 
loyalty was kindled upon its altar before 
the Revolution, and that flame has never 
gone out. From its adherents was formed 
that club, known as ^^Sons of Liberty," 
which sounded the earliest effective call 
for a Continental Congress. In its longest 
pastorate it was served by John Rodgers, 
who by prayer and sermon, as with 
the voice of a trumpet, wrought for the 

7 



An American Patriot 

independence of the colonies ; the inti- 
mate companion of that Witherspoon, 
who turned the scale when the " Declara- 
tion " hung in an uncertain balance ; the 
confidential correspondent of Washing- 
ton ; the chaplain of Heath's Brigade while 
the fight was on, and of the first Legisla- 
ture of New York when the Colony be- 
came a State. Many of its members smelt 
powder and won honor upon Revolutionary 
battlefields, like doughty Elder McDougal 
— who went to the front in the ranks, and 
returned in the generalship. Its house of 
worship was a shining mark for the ribald 
abuse of British soldiery during their 
occupation of the city ; and their use of 
it as barracks, as riding school, as stable, 
left it at the close of the war bearing the 
scars of a ruinous but honorable deface- 
ment ; the severity of which bore witness 
to its fame as a nursery of Americanism. 
Memories of the patriotic past hover in 
this atmosphere. These walls are haunted 
with an illustrious company of those who 
loved their land better than their life. In 
their name I bid you thrice welcome to 
the House of their God. 

Such a reminiscence may serve to re- 
mind us of the peculiar dignity of this 



An American Patriot 

service. It is no empty form. It is no 
vain-glorious function. In imitation of 
the patriot of the text, who strove to 
inaugurate a revival of patriotism, we 
reverently scrutinize the register of 
" them who came up at the first,'' and 
with no mean pride, we boast ourselves 
" the children of the province that went 
up out of the captivity." We solemnly 
remind ourselves that we are the heirs of 
a splendid past, and must therefore play a 
worthy part while we are upon the stage. 
We recall the fact that we stand in a line 
of noble ancestry, and must hand on to 
the coming time an untarnished name. 
We refresh the recollection that we are 
guardians of a national treasure which our 
fathers purchased with their blood and 
which we must therefore cherish as our 
life. We emphasize the truth that our 
costliest heritage is neither of gold, nor of 
land, nor of rank, but of character. We 
cannot too often contemplate the virtues 
of those who " came up at the first," nor 
catalogue too carefully the elements of 
that power by which they led these prov- 
inces out of their captivity. We cannot 
too fondly study *' The Lineage of an 
American Patriot." 



An American Patriot 

I. Those who *' came up at the first," 
were men of Thought. 

Baron Steuben, Washington's drill- 
master, wrote to a friend in the Old World: 

"You say to your soldier, ' Do this,' and 
he doeth it. I am obliged to say to mine, 
' This is the reason why you ought to do 
this/ and then he doeth it." The Revolu- 
tion was the offspring of reason. It was 
not the creature of sentiment. It was a 
swing of the tide and not the spurt of a 
geyser. The American leaders were no 
hair-brained enthusiasts, adrift upon a 
torrent of unreasoning emotion. They 
had been cradled among the traditions 
of England's golden age of intellectual 
power. Their nursery tales were mem- 
ies of the University life in their 
motherland. They built school houses 
before they had barns, and the school 
houses became "martello towers" in 
the fight for freedom. They founded 
colleges in the wilderness clearings — and 
at Harvard, Yale and Princeton the beacon 
lights of liberty were kindled. Their 
manual of citizenship was the New Eng- 
land Primer, and whatever worth may 
attach to the Westminster Catechism as a 
system of theology — it is beyond compare 

lO 



An American Patriot 

as a mental whetstone. In their remote 
and rugged dwellings Truth lent them the 
inspiration of her queenly presence. Fa- 
miliar with her, they faced unabashed the 
tinsel trappings of earthly royalty. They 
read the signs of the times more accur- 
ately than those who sat upon thrones. 
They proved themselves a match for the 
shrewd diplomatists of Europe. In the 
clearer air of the hither shore of the At- 
lantic they distinctly foresaw the gather- 
ing clouds of conflict, and with unerring 
insight forecast the march of the storm. 
They were masters in the art of running 
a principle back to its roots, and out to its 
consequences. They could see infinite 
meanings in a penny stamp. They could 
cast the horoscope of the world with tea 
leaves. They cried *' What a glorious 
morning " when the crack of the flintlocks 
at Lexington ushered in a long and dire- 
ful day of darkness and blood. The 
Revolution is a measure of the brain-force 
of such men as long-headed Samuel 
Adams; far-sighted James Otis; brave 
Warren, who died so eloquently at Bunker 
Hill; of the courtly and cultured Jeffer- 
son ;'of fiery Patrick Henry; and of him 
who sat like Jupiter among the immortals 

II 



An American Patriot 

— that child of Solomon — Benjamin Frank- 
lin whose piercing sagacity and sun-bright 
intellect beamed through such a benign 
and guileless countenance. When the 
thoughts of these men ripened '^ Boston 
harbor was black with unexpected tea: a 
Pennsylvania Congress gathered, and De- 
mocracy announced in rifle volleys, under 
her star banner, to the tune of Yankee- 
Doodle-Doo, that she is born, and whirl- 
wind-like, will envelope the whole world." 

II. Those "who come up at the first'' 
were Men of Action. 

They were thinkers, but not dreamers. 
The story of the Revolution is the chroni- 
cle of a people in action. It is an index 
of the momentum of the masses when set 
in motion by the energy of a great idea. 
The colonists did their own fighting. 
They hired no Hessians. They unleashed 
no Indians. They accepted no proxies. 
Inspired with lofty thoughts they trans- 
lated their convictions into actions. They 
argued their principles with the edge 
of the sword and the point of the bayonet. 
They counted the cost carefully, and they 
paid it calmly. They kept cool in the 
midst of a conflagration which consumed 
the cherished governmental structures of 

12 



An American Patriot 

ages. They set their hands to the plough, 
and never turned back, but ran their fur- 
rows deep and true. In deed they showed 
themselves even more eloquent than in 
speech. Ease could not tempt them. 
Hardship could not daunt them. Poverty 
could not impoverish them. Treachery 
and brutality could not conquer them. The 
fierce cold of winter, and the deadlier chill 
of their country's indifference, they with- 
stood with an inflexible fortitude. A raw 
militia was schooled under fire into an 
army which wrested the laurels of victory 
from a banner which never before went 
backward. They wore home-spun as 
though it was imperial purple. They did 
grand things without sounding a trumpet 
before themselves. They achieved the 
sublime as thoup-h it were the common- 
place. They wrought heroism with sim- 
plicity. 

They lent grandeur to geography. They 
multiplied upon the earth the abiding 
places of nobility. At Bunker Hill, from 
behind a rail fence fortress, they looked 
into the very whites of tyranny's eyes, 
and met its advance with a blast of death 
as from the mouth of a volcano. At Con- 
cord Bridge,they crossed a more portentous 

13 



An American Patriot 

Rubicon than that which lay between 
Caesar and the Eternal City. At Prince- 
ton, they taught my Lord Cornwallis a 
lesson which had been omitted from the 
curriculum of his academic training. At 
Valley Forge, they stood on guard unmur- 
muring and unfearing beneath the shadow 
of death. At Saratoga, they inflicted a 
hurt upon that vaunted divinity with 
which a throne is hedged, that all the 
healing waters of the world can never 
medicine. At Yorktown — the masters of 
themselves, as well as the conquerors of 
the King — they stood sublimely silent in 
the moment of supreme victory, leaving 
posterity to cheer them. This constella- 
tion of names they have made to shine with 
the starry light of exalted purpose, stead- 
fast endurance, unmeasured sacrifice, 
high courage, a love of the right which 
death could not quench, a devotion to the 
liberties of humanity which they sealed 
with the gift of their life. 

III. They who ''came up at the first" 
were Men of God. 

The impulse to leave England and seek 
America was not the thirst for adventure 
nor the love of conquest, but the longing 
to rightly honor God. A sense of fealty 

14 



An American Patriot 

to the King of kings was the guiding star 
which our fathers followed. A spirit of 
allegiance to the throne of heaven was the 
breath of life in the character of those who 
were the founders of our native land. 
Said the Philosopher — "■ I think, therefore 
I am." Said the Puritan — ^' I believe, 
therefore I can." They subscribed them- 
selves subjects of the King of heaven from 
the hour in which they signed the com- 
pact in the cabin of the Mayflower, until 
the day they voted to open the sessions of 
the Constitutional Convention with prayer. 
The lanters which flashed out at the 
birth of liberty, were hung in the steeple 
of a church. At Louisburg, victory was 
won under a banner bearing the motto 
which the apostolic Whitfield had sug- 
gested : '* Nil desperandum Christo Duce^' 
— a blazon like that upon the laburnum of 
Constantine. At Ticonderoga, the forts 
were taken " In the name of Jehovah and 
the Continental Congress," waking along 
the shores of Champlain the war cry which 
the Hebrew revolutionists of the olden 
time had sent pealing among the hills of 
Canaan. On the Liberty Bell was en- 
graved a text of Scripture, and in the 
words af inspiration its deep-throated 

15 



An American Patriot 

tones proclaimed *' Liberty throughout the 
land unto all the inhabitants thereof/' 
The men who would not kneel to King 
George on Lexington Common, bowed 
day by day in family prayer in the Massa- 
chusetts farm-houses. In response to 
Lord Howe's offer of a royal pardon, old 
Trumbull, of Connecticut, voiced the 
universal feeling when he bluftiy said, 
** No doubt all need the pardon of heaven 
for our manifold sins and transgressions, 
but the American who needs the pardon 
of his Britannic Majesty is yet to be 
found. " The " Old Continentals " fought 
the battles of the State with Bibles in 
their knapsacks. They studied the mili- 
tary genius of Moses by the light of their 
camp fires. They sang the Psalms of 
David while cannon boomed the accom- 
paniment. They knelt at the throne of 
God in the hour of darkness, and they 
crowned His altar with thanksgiving in 
the day of triumph. When the clouds 
were thickest and all hearts were sore ; 
when the treasury was empty, and grim- 
visaged disaster was knocking at the gate- 
way, Congress ordered an appropriation 
not only for the purchase of gunpowder, 
but also for the importation of twenty- 
id 



An American Patriot 

thousand copies of the Scriptures. These 
pioneer spirits were masters of a profound 
diplomacy. They knew what no Ameri- 
can should ever forget — that Bible truth is 
the sort of ammunition most effective in 
the vindication of national honor. The 
Pilgrim Fathers feared none but God; so 
all their foes feared them. 

These traits of our fathers were crys- 
tallized in the character of George 
Washington. 

The Revolutionary period is dominated 
by his personality. The history of its 
years resolves itself into his biography. 
The centre of its forces was his potent in- 
dividuality; and all its energies and inci- 
dents seem satellite to him. An English 
writer has said, " He was greatest of good 
men and the best of great men." In 
thought he was great. He looked at facts 
precisely as they were, and he understood 
precisely what they meant. In action he 
was great. He rode the whirlwind with a 
firm seat. He kept the ** strenuous uphill 
road " until he stood upon the shining sum- 
mits of victory. The temper of his soul 
rang out when being told at Trenton that 
the guns were wet and could not be fired, 
he replied, " Use bayonets, then. The 

17 



An American Patriot 

town must be taken." In faitJi he was 
great. He would not have been altogether 
great otherwise. Infidelity is inconsistent 
with nobility. A doubter makes a poor 
leader. The principles of unbelief are 
not those for which men care to shed their 
blood. With his whole soul he believed 
in God, unashamed to confess dependence 
upon Divine strength, unashamed to bow 
the knee at the Divine throne, unashamed 
to cherish to his latest hour, in unostenta- 
tious simplicity, that piety which had 
come to him in childhood, warm from his 
mother's heart. 

A two-fold glory crowns him. Beneath 
the Cambridge Elm, he bared the sword 
and led a mighty revolution without a 
taint of crime. Upon the Wall street 
balcony, he kissed the Bible and founded 
a splendid commonwealth without the 
shadow of ambition. 

The note of independence was struck 
for him by orphanage in his boyhood. 
The art of walking in untravelled ways 
was mastered, as theodolite in hand 
he penetrated the shadowy wilderness. 
Indian foes schooled him in the secrets of 
strategic and patient warfare. Beneath 
the banner against which he came to fight, 

i8 



An American Patriot 

he learned to listen without a tremor to 
the whistle of bullets. The reins of the 
Revolutionary movement dropped into 
his hands instinctively. He was God- 
gifted for such a part. His was a soul un- 
shaken by disaster, unbetrayed by success. 
His spirit never sank when fortune ebbed; 
and never lowered its guard when fortune 
smiled. Coupled with inflexible adherence 
to lofty principle was a shrewd kindness 
that stooped to conquer, and won when it 
seemed to yield. He knew how to lose a 
battle so as to gain a campaign. He was 
contented that others should win the 
laurels, so long as America won the war. 
He was the bond-slave of a supreme pur- 
pose to glorify his native land. In the day 
of battle, he contended that the Colonies 
must be freed by an American soldiery. 
In the time of peace, he planned to open 
wide domains for the conquest of Ameri- 
can industry. He looked beyond the 
mountain tops, and strove to open a gate- 
way for the march of an American civiliza- 
tion out upon the imperial plains of the 
West. He kept his eye beyond the sea 
and studied to impress foreign powers 
with the peculiar and subtle genius 
of American institutions. He would 

19 



An American Patriot 

curb immigration lest alien elements 
should leaven American individuality. He 
left by will funds to found an American 
University, because he believed the at- 
mosphere of foreign schools '^unfriendly 
to republican government and the liber- 
ties of mankind/' He stood far in advance 
of his time. He has a place upon the 
loftiest plane to which men have risen. 
The monument upon the banks of the Po- 
tomac, so grand in its simplicity, clothed 
with white purity, soaring into the upper 
air, aspiring toward the unclouded blue, 
keeping changeless vigil over the Capital 
City through all the fluctuations of the 
years, is a striking materialization of his 
character. 

Of such a Revolution we are the child- 
ren. Of this illustrious man we are the 
heirs. The token of our ancestral descent 
is the reproduction of those elements of 
character which made our fathers great. 
Thoughtfulness, energy and piety consti- 
tute the triple birthmark of an American 
Patriot. 

I. A true Son of the Revolution will 
think. 

Neither imagination nor passion will 
sway the sceptre over him. The story of his 

20 



An American Patriot 

country will be studied with serious affec- 
tion. The character forces of its founders 
will be patiently analyzed.. The princi- 
ples by which they were actuated in the 
formation of the government will be 
scrutinized. The historic development of 
our nationality will be surveyed. Present 
day questions will be viewed in the light 
of a calm and unexcited intelligence. The 
collision with Spain will be seen to be the 
final phase of an irrepressible conflict 
which has been in progress for three hun- 
dred years. The drawing together of 
England and America, will be recognized 
as the normal and irresistible advance of 
those principles with w^hich the Saxon 
races have been entrusted for the good of 
the world. The momentous and unsought 
responsibility of a guardian care over re- 
mote peoples which has been thrust upon 
the nation, will be viewed in its true light 
as a glorious opportunity to scatter far 
abroad those treasures of liberty and truth 
which are our dearest possessions. 

In the Revolution, America won liberty. 
In the Civil War, America achieved na- 
tionality. In the campaign of 1898, Amer- 
ica rose into new and holy relations with 
humanity. Necessity has been laid upon 

21 



Ax Amikica!! Patuot 

US to send J and iiinstraxe a new idea in the 
fogi e ss of the nee, — the obli^ration of a 
strong and prosperoos peo|de to minister 
to the woe of the world beyond its own 
frontiers. 

n. A true Son of the Rerolnticm will 

Z"fr "SI :i;::r in the pro- 

: ■ Z = ch indi- 

'.:."- r nation's 

:_:-.ire. Nc: - .lz ~ -e alone is a 

7 1 t ■ Not in the 

*-^ -^licy of 
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em to be. Civic evils 

be citizen's apathj. 

"- Trpon the State do 

^'g^ish opposition. 

- ' : — ent to the torpid 

tz: folk. There 

Immorality 

::^ ::-:e5 :- Piety 



An American Patriot 

Hill. That ancestral energy which, with- 
out equipment, or disciplinCj or money, 
or popular support, withstood the armies 
of the King, baffled the navy of Britain, 
drove the Hessians back across the sea 
and founded the national government, is 
suflSciently ^ngorous, if it be sufficiently 
awake, to convert a political party into an 
orgfanized conscience, and to dictate terms 
to any evil which challenges the common 
weal. One man may do but little, but he 
can always act as though he was the one 
upon whose fidelity the future pivotted. 
A pestilence is said to reside in an atomic 
microbe. A contagion of good is stored 
in a solitary manhood that dares to '* stand 
foresquare, whatever wind may below." 

III. A true Son of the Revolution will 
believe in God. 

Lest you think this the perfunctory 
pronunciamento of the pulpit, listen 
to the words of Washington — " No 
people can be bound to acknowledge 
and adore an invisible hand which con- 
ducts the affairs of men more than the 
people of the United States. Of all the 
dispositions which lead to political pros- 
perity, religion and morality are the indis- 
pensable supports. In vain would that 

23 



An American Patriot 

man claim the tribute of patriotism who 
should labor to subvert these great pillars 
of human happiness." Irreligion is 
un-American. Skepticism is contrary to 
the genius of this country. Unbelief savors 
of disloyalty. When the Bible is assailed, 
remember Andrew Jackson said "That 
Book is the rock bed of the Republic." 
When prayer is scoffed at, remember Lin- 
coln asked the nation to supplicate the 
favor of God in his behalf. When the 
home is undermined, remember that 
hallowed Virginian fireside, where Wash- 
ington was cradled. When the Sabbath 
is disregarded, remember how he issued 
special orders for its observance in the 
army. When blasphemy and immorality 
and gambling are treated as ethical trifles, 
remember how the Commander of the 
Continental army called upon those who 
aspired to lead the forces that fought for 
freedom, to vindicate their claim to oUch 
a distinction by abstinence from such 
iniquities. It is by the favor of God we 
are what we are. Our fathers felt it and 
said it. We are false to our blood, if we 
forget it, or conceal it. IngersoUville can 
never be the capital city of a great nation. 
Brigham Young's barouche's is not a fit 

24 



An American Patriot 

conveyance for Miss Columbia to ride in. 
In this land one is free to worship accord- 
ing to the dictates of his own conscience, 
but he is no true American who counts it 
freedom to sneak into Congress over the 
shattered fragments of a solemn compact, 
and make laws for others while he breaks 
them himself. In this land one is free to 
worship no God, but he loves not his 
country who counts it freedom to become 
an apostle of the red flag and preach a 
gospel of dynamite. In this land one is 
free to live the lonely life of him who has 
no altarplace, and hears no voice of hope, 
but he is false to his patriotic ancestry 
who counts it freedom to attack and 
deride that faith for which our fathers 
suffered the loss of all things, and to scoff 
at that Holy Name, honoring which they 
laid the foundations of the nation. Only 
if we fail here, is catastrophe possible. 
The light will not cease to shine upon our 
future pathway, so long as we recognize 
the truth that " duty makes destiny." 
Difficulty and sacrifice, internal evils, and 
outside perils, these things cannot rob 
America of her glory. She can only lose 
her grandeur, when she uncrowns herself 
by turning her back upon the God of 

25 



An American Patriot 

our fachers, and ceasing to obey His 
voice. 

When the musketry of Lexington roused 
Samuel Adams, he saluted the sunrise with 
the cry, " What a glorious morning." 
Strange words from so shrewd a judge of 
affairs! That early sunlight shone upon 
dead bodies and desolated homes. That 
day was the harbinger of dark and weary 
years, of crushing woes, and of untold 
anguish to uncounted hearts, Adams was 
right. His gaze was upon the time to 
come. He saw emerging from the mists 
of that grey dawn, a glorious nation, made 
strong in the school of suffering, made 
pure with a baptism of blood, made ready 
for an exalted and triumphant mission by 
communion with the God of battles. 

The guns of Dewey ushered in the dawn 
of such another day. This is the twilight 
hour of tumult and confusion, of the clash 
of opinions and the struggle of prejudices. 
The wounds of conflict are still unhealed. 
The sweat of battle is not yet wiped 
away. On the one hand is timidity — on 
the other asperity. The brazen cry of 
greed is heard, and the serpentine hiss of 
cunning. But a glorious daybreak has 
come. Ere long the mists of the morning 

26 



An American Patriot 

shall have vanished away. The sun, 
which is just creeping above the Eastern 
hilltops, shall ride in mid-heaven clad with 
unclouded splendor by-and-by. In the 
years which are to come, lands redeemed 
from tyranny and made rich with the 
choicest stores of a Christian civilization; 
peoples rescued from ignorance and bar- 
barism and uplifted to a place among the 
nations of the earth; races saved from 
savagry, and dowered with the priceless 
blessings of civil and religious liberty, will 
recall the roar of those fateful cannon, 
and look back to these sombre hours of 
the bared sword, and the smoking mus- 
ket, and will utter the grateful cry, 
*' What a glorious morning. God bless 
the United States." 



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